The court order came on a plea moved by Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly Suvendu Adhikari who alleged violence and rigging of votes when the polls were on.
Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday asked the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) in New Delhi to conduct a forensic audit of the CCTV cameras that were used during the recently-concluded Contai Municipality election in West Bengal. The CFSL was also asked to submit a report to the court in six weeks.
The court order came on a plea moved by Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly Suvendu Adhikari who alleged violence and rigging of votes when the polls were on.
A Bench comprising Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava and Justice Rajarshi Bharadwaj while reading out a gist of the order on Tuesday said, that notwithstanding the constitutional bar under Article 243-ZG (b) of the Constitution of India, such a direction is required in the “larger public interest” and to uphold the democratic principles.
Asking the State Election Commission (SEC) to mark the polling booth numbers with each CCTV footage, the Calcutta High Court asked the SEC to hand over the preserved footage to CFSL in days.
The CFSL has been asked by the court to examine the footage and report on the alleged booth capturing, violence and rigging of votes. The court has also reportedly given freehand to the CFSL to seek any document from the State Election Commission but only after informing the court.
After the recently-concluded municipal election held across 108 civic bodies in West Bengal, reports of violence on polling day and also after the results were recorded across the state. While the ruling faction had alleged the role of the Opposition, the latter trained its guns at the government.